


One Second To The Next

by TheCommanderCas



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Blood mentioned!, Bucky Loses His Arm, Car accident!, F/M, High School AU, Just a one shot for now?, M/M, Multi, Probably will write more, bucky lost his arm in a car accident
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-09
Updated: 2019-08-12
Packaged: 2020-08-13 08:26:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20171188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheCommanderCas/pseuds/TheCommanderCas
Summary: Steve Rogers is about to start his senior year at Shield Private High School. On an unusual day when Steve sleeps in, instead of going to lift weights with his friends, he gets a grim call from Tony.





	1. This Is Why Steve Doesn't Sleep In

**Author's Note:**

> I'll probably write more on this but this part has been stuck in my head for ages! They're all in high school. Age wise it pretty much goes like this
> 
> Seniors  
Steve  
Thor  
Tony  
Bruce
> 
> Juniors  
Clint  
Natasha  
Stephen
> 
> Sophomore  
Loki
> 
> Everything else is kind of straightforward after that. Leave comments. This is the first thing I've ever published here.

The day had started out pretty normal. A lazy summer morning with school only a month away. Steve usually wasn’t one for lazy mornings, preferring to bounce out of bed at six in the morning to get a run in and maybe hit the gym. Football season was going to start pretty soon after school started and he liked to maintain his good shape. This morning though, he’d slept through his alarm which was unusual but he figured one day of sleeping in wouldn’t hurt him. It was raining anyway. As he pulled himself from bed, he grabbed his phone to see if he had any messages. There were a few, mostly from Bucky trying to wake him because he and Thor were wanting to lift with him. When they received no response, they decided to go without him. There were a couple others. Natasha had asked if he wanted to join everyone else and get some lunch together. His group of friends was very diverse for high school and once school started it was hard to get everyone together so they always spent the last month trying to hang out as much as possible ending with a two week vacation to Tony’s fancy summer home in Malibu. 

Steve lazily replied to everyone as he made himself some toast for breakfast. He lived in a nice one bedroom apartment which might have been strange for a soon to be high school senior with no job but Tony’s family was very generous. After Steve’s parents died, his father passing in his early childhood and his mother dying when he turned fourteen, they very kindly offered to let him move into the same building they ran for other students of Shield Private High School and paid for his schooling. Nearly everyone in his group (minus Tony) also lived there, each in their own little apartments, and financed by the Starks. The group of them had been close friends since childhood and he appreciated that the Starks were keeping them together and out of the legal system. 

Steve was half done getting dressed, when his phone started ringing. He grabbed it with a slight frown. “Hey Tony. I told Nat I had to take a shower before I met up with you guys,” he answered.

“No um Steve,” Tony said sounding grim which was never a good sign and made the hair on the back of Steve’s neck stand up. “You uh… You need to come to the hospital.” 

“What? Why? What’s wrong?” he asked worried, heart beginning to hammer. In his gut he knew it had to do with Bucky. He could sense it. 

Tony sighed heavily. “There was an accident. Thor and Bucky were in a crash leaving the gym. Thor is okay but Bucky is in surgery.” 

That was a punch to the gut if Steve ever felt one. He and Bucky were very close. It was nearly impossible to find one without the other. “I’m on my way. How bad is it?” he asked seriously shoving his feet into some shoes. 

“Happy is outside waiting on you. It’s… It’s bad but I’ll explain it once you get here. It’s a lot Cap.” Even Tony’s nickname for him didn’t have any heart to it. 

Steve wasn’t sure he could take losing someone else close to him. Bucky had been his rock when he’d lost his ma. Always had his back in a fight. He loved the other boy. He knew that. He shakily went outside where Tony’s driver Happy was waiting for him. He climbed in and rode in stunned silence. Once at the hospital he nearly ran in. Everyone else was already there. Thor looked shellshocked as he sat on a chair in the waiting room. Loki was trying to comfort him but it was up in the air if Thor was even aware. His shirt was covered in blood. Upon remembering that Tony told him Thor was fine, he felt sick realizing that was probably all Bucky’s blood. 

Steve registered Bruce giving him a hug and hugged back. He looked at Tony who seemed to know the most about the situation which didn’t surprise him. It was sort of Tony’s role to know what was going on with everyone. His family did pay for everything after all. Clint sometimes teased Tony and called him the group’s mother. Tony came over with Natasha and Clint in tow. 

“How bad is it?” he asked glancing back at Thor who was still frozen. 

“Well… what we know from Thor is that they were leaving the gym. Thor was driving,” Tony said. “Someone swerved into their lane. Thor swerved toward the shoulder of the road. He said that it gets dark from there but when he came around, when the EMTs were there, part… well um… part of Bucky’s arm was in Thor’s lap.” 

No wonder Thor was so distressed. Steve didn’t know how he would respond to that himself. Much the same most likely. Or just block it out and never remember it again. The blond teen looked over and then back at Tony. 

“Apparently they hit a street light center on the vehicle. Bucky threw his arm out to grab Thor,” Natasha explained. “That’s what the police said.” 

“Have any doctors told you what’s going on?” Steve asked. 

“The doctor that got him through the ER until the surgeon came said that his arm was really damaged,” she said softly. “He lost a lot of blood. They think he’ll be okay and they’re going to try and save as much of the arm as they can.” 

“He’s going to be so pissed to miss football season,” Clint joked trying to lighten the mood.

“Nah. I’ll make him some sort of badass arm,” Tony said. Knowing the genius he already had everything worked out in his head and it was just the minor details and the building that was left to do it. “He won’t even have to miss a game.” 

Steve smiled a little, glad his friends were there for support. This would be hard on all of them. Bucky most of all. It was a life changing injury. He glanced over at Thor and went over to check on him. Seeing Steve seemed to get a response out of the larger teen. 

“Steve I… I’m sorry,” Thor said. “I didn’t mean-“ 

Steve put a hand up to stop Thor’s panic, for which Loki seemed grateful. “This wasn’t your fault Thor,” he said seriously. “No one blames you and I know Bucky won’t blame you. Accidents happen. It’s slick outside from the rain. Someone swerved into your lane. You tried to protect the both of you. If Bucky wouldn’t have been such a mom and threw his arm out to protect you then he’d be fine. This isn’t on you. Why don’t you go home and get cleaned up? I’m sure he’s going to be in surgery for a while longer.” 

“He’s right Thor,” Loki encouraged. “You don’t want to go in there covered in blood either.” 

Thor hesitated but relented in the end. He left with Loki to go clean up. Steve sighed. He knew that his friends would have to recover. He wanted to be there for Bucky and he would be. Luck had smiled on them by it not being worse. No one was dead. Bucky had some serious damage but with Tony involved he would have something beyond state of the art to replace the arm, so good that it would probably upgrade the real arm that Bucky had been born with. All t


	2. Aftermath

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky wakes up and Steve tries to get him to talk about how he's taking things

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for the kudos guys! I know this chapter is much ado about nothing it feels. I sometimes suck at emotions. Haha. I would have had this up sooner but my computer tried to update and then it fucked the entire thing up and I had to reset it. It saved most of my files but this was open and unsaved when my computer decided to eat it. 
> 
> Please keep up the kudos and comments. What's something you'd like to see in this story? How would you handle the situation?

It seemed to take forever for the doctor to come out and talk to them about Bucky. Steve had almost paced a moat in the waiting room. Everyone agreed that he should go back first since Steve was the closet to Bucky and they couldn’t let everyone go back at once. So Steve shuffled down the hall to Bucky’s room and took a seat next to him. It was hard to see his best friend laying in that bed. He seemed smaller somehow. Maybe it was the blatant lack of arm. Bucky’s left shoulder just stopped there. The doctor had said that it had been so badly crushed that whatever hadn’t immediately been cut off had to be removed by the doctors. Other than the arm there were some minor cuts and bruises on the left side of Bucky’s head. Bucky woke up just a few minutes after he sat down, a small groan escaping as he tried to pull at the wires and tubes attached to his body.

“Whoa. Slow down there Buck,” Steve said catching his hand and pulling it away. “You need all that stuff. Doctors might get mad if you pull your heart monitor off and cause a panic.” 

Bucky drug his blue eyes over to him, a bit of a glazed over look them left over from the anesthetic from the surgery. “Stevie?” he mumbled. “What…?” 

Steve offered a small, slightly apologetic smile. “Yeah. It’s me. Do you remember what happened?” 

Bucky frowned trying to remember. “An accident maybe?” He looked over at his arm, apparently realizing when he tried to move it nothing happened. His heart rate instantly sky rocketed. 

“Hey hey hey,” Steve said trying to bring him back. “Focus on me for a second. I know it’s hard to do with this ugly mug.” 

That got a bit of a smirk out of his friend but he was still tense and a little panicked, not that Steve could blame him. It was a shock to wake up without a limb. Still, Bucky put forth a great effort by looking at Steve. 

“Your arm is gone,” he said. No point in denying the obvious. “You were in a car accident with Thor. It got really damaged and they had to remove it up to the shoulder.” 

Bucky nodded. HE was always good at taking things in stride so the next words out of Bucky’s mouth didn’t surprise Steve at all. “Well… there goes my dazzling career in two handed sword wielding.” 

Steve chuckled. “I wouldn’t count on that. Tony already plans on building you something to replace it. If you ask him nicely, he might add like a rocket launcher or something.”

“I’m going to ask for a rocket launcher and maybe a blue tooth speaker,” he chuckled. He sighed after a moment. “Is Thor okay?” 

“Yeah. He’s fine. A few scrapes but nothing serious. Wanna see him? They won’t let all of us in here at once right now because you’re just waking up. Tomorrow should be fine though.” 

“Yeah. Please send him in,” Bucky said. “Truck totaled? Man Mr. Stark is going to be pissed.” 

“I don’t think he’s going to care about the truck,” Steve said, sending a quick text to Tony to have Thor come down to the room. Material possessions were nothing for the Starks after all. They had more money than they knew what to do with which explained why the owned an apartment building full of orphans and paid for everything they’d ever need. Including their vehicles. “Honestly it could have been a lot worse and I’m sure that they’re just glad it wasn’t.” 

Bucky nodded a bit as Thor shuffled in. 

“You look like shit,” Thor said trying to be his normal happy self. Steve appreciated the attempt. 

“I kinda feel like shit,” Bucky said with a chuckle. “You okay man? You know this wasn’t your fault, right? If I didn’t act like a mom, I’d have both arms.” 

Thor and Steve both chuckled. It was clear Bucky’s reassurance that he didn’t blame Thor for the loss of his limb was a huge weight off the long-haired blond. Bucky wasn’t the type to hold a grudge so even if it had been his fault Steve knew Bucky would have forgiven him. 

“Don’t beat yourself up Thor. Accidents happen and I’m sure Tony is going to basically put the worlds most advanced arm on me. It’ll be an upgrade.” 

That really seemed to get Thor’s spirits up. Steve stepped out and let everyone cycle through to see Bucky. The next day the nurses said that he could have more in the room at once. They just didn’t want to overwhelm Bucky at the moment. Steve settled in to spend the night. They released Bucky about a week later. Tony already had a prototype but they’d have to wait until Bucky finished healing to attach it since it would require a delicate and long surgery but between Tony, Bruce, and their friend Stephen, who was relatively new to the group, they’d get it figured out. Howard promised to throw whatever money needed to make sure that Bucky had the best doctors money could afford them. 

In the meantime, everyone decided that it was time for a vacation so they were going to Malibu early. Everyone seemed to be watching Bucky. They were watching for signs of depression. Suffering. Pain. Anything that could have indicated that he wasn’t handling this as wonderfully as he was making people believe. Steve knew his best friend. Bucky could handle a lot of things and took most things in stride because he didn’t want to worry people. The problem was that Steve tended to worry anyway about his friends. Especially Bucky who’d always been there for him. Once they were in Malibu for a few days, Steve decided to sit Bucky down and talk to him. 

It seemed that Bucky knew his plan because he seemed to go out of his way to not be alone with Steve. He’d duck out of any conversation or drag someone around relentlessly. Though Steve did manage to get him alone one night when he heard someone wandering the halls of the house and got up to investigate only to find Bucky walking around, eating a plum. 

“Hey Buck,” Steve said.

“Oh. Hey Stevie. I didn’t mean to wake you up,” he said apologetically. 

“It’s okay. I’ve been trying to get a chance to talk to you.” 

“I know and I have been trying to avoid this conversation,” Bucky responded with a small laugh. 

Steve could only offer a little bit of a frown though. “Why’s that? We never avoid each other. I remember a certain someone that made me sit and talk after my ma died because ‘if you don’t talk about it, you’ll never get over it’ or something like that,” he said. 

Bucky sighed, taking another bite of his plum. “This is a bit different than that Steve.” 

“I know it has to be hard Bucky. I don’t’ expect you to act like it’s okay. None of us do. This is a big… it’s a big deal and no one else is going to make you sit and really talk about it but I will because you need it.” 

“What do you want me to say Steve? Yes. I’m all fucked up because my arm is gone. I can’t do half the things like I want. I doubt my hair has been properly cleaned since the accident because I don’t know how to do it with one hand yet. I cried trying to brush my teeth last night because I kept knocking the toothbrush over when I tried to put the toothpaste on and made a huge mess. I feel lopsided and broken. I know Tony is working on a new arm but in the meantime, I’m stuck like this and my life will never be the same.” Bucky steadily got more upset as he spoke until the other boy’s voice was shaking with emotion. “And I don’t want to ask for help because who would? Who wants to be like hey can someone help button my pants or tie my shoes? I feel like a little kid.” 

“I know you don’t want to ask for help Bucky but that’s what we’re here for. We’re your friends. We want to help you. I know you’re going to have to relearn how to do some stuff with just one arm but let us help you when you need it,” Steve urged. He hugged his best friend tightly. “You’re my best friend. You were there for me in the worst times of my life and I’ll be with you for yours. Till the end of the line.” 

Bucky gripped back as tight as he could. After they broke apart, he chuckled. “Jeez there Stevie. Make it sound like you’re proposing marriage.” 

Steve laughed a little. “Maybe after college. We’ll never get any scholarships if we get married now,” he said. “Need any help with anything?” 

Bucky shifted a little. “Yeah could you stay in my room?” he asked tentatively after a long moment. “I keep having nightmares of the crash and it’s hard to sleep.” 

Steve gave a gentle smile. “Of course.”


End file.
